Danish paper refuses Holocaust cartoons

Published:01:08Updated:10:21Thursday 09 February 2006

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THE top editor of the Danish newspaper which sparked outrage throughout the Islamic world when it published cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad said last night that he would not be printing Holocaust cartoons offered by an Iranian newspaper.

Earlier yesterday, the paper's cultural editor, Flemming Rose, had said he was trying to co-ordinate with an Iranian paper soliciting cartoons on the Holocaust.

But Carsten Juste, editor-in-chief of Jyllands-Posten said his newspaper "in no circumstances will publish Holocaust cartoons from an Iranian newspaper".

His comments came after an Iranian newspaper, Hamshahri, said on Tuesday it would hold a competition for cartoons on the Holocaust to test whether or not the West extended the principle of freedom of expression to the Nazi genocide, as it did to the caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad.

"I have committed an error," Mr Rose said in an interview with Danish television last night, adding: "I am 100 per cent with the newspaper's line and Carsten Juste in this case."

Mr Juste has rejected suggestions that he step down in the wake of the furore, which has brought fatal protests and the burning of two Danish embassies in the Middle East.

In a brief statement on the paper's website, Mr Juste said: "I do not feel called ... in that direction."